Category Archives: Writing

Diabetes I Am…

Posted on by
3

(some rhymes I threw together about my life with diabetes…)

 

I was diagnosed with it as an eight year old,

Just a little boy that did what he was told;

No questions asked just a promise to foresee:

This type one diabetes, it ain’t ever beating me.

 

The Doc approached with a rather large needle,

The old 90s-style syringe did appear evil,

Doc said, “Gav you got to start insulin injecting,”

I replied, “Doc, you ain’t coming near me with that thing!”

 

I took my own jabs myself from the very word go,

And by my return to school I was a needle-taking pro!

The main symptoms during pre-diagnosis for me

Were that every few seconds I had to drink then go pee!

 

I learned the differences between hypers and hypos:

One is where you crazy-hi, the other a foul-mouthed-low;

Keeping a balance in between seemed the way to role,

So I kept check of me sugars to keep good control.

 

In school I learned how to get my own way,

I’d fake a hypo to sneak out of class to go and play!

They used say something about stick and stones,

But when some words hurt, I went and broke some bones…

 

As a kid I was always the kind of dreamer,

And out playing footy on the playground I scored screamers;

Some 11-aside matches had my sugar-levels dropping low,

But out on the pitch I was banging semi-pro!

 

My first charity run was raising funds for my clinic,

A 29 mile run, would that require a magic trick?

They told me I was too young, diabetic, it’s impossible to do it;

Impossible is nothing, run completed in 3 hours and 1 minute!

 

Some used to nickname me “the Iron-Man”,

But the truth is I was always half-human;

Failure hit me in 2009 knocked down in the Isle of Wight,

Hypo and injuries persisted as time fell too tight;

 

A year later I returned back to the scene,

The 70 mile Isle where previously beaten I had been.

This time I was stronger, the option of failure had no hint,

I powered through the pain to finish 70 miles with a sprint!

 

In 2011 the family lost someone, an uncle to me,

Michael, always there supporting wherever I may be;

Injuries were bad and my HBA1C levels lost control,

But I bounced back up like the unwhackable-mole…

 

2012 the year of great things to be achieved,

A new identity, The Diathlete, to be believed;

44 miles in a single day running over cliff tops,

Determination saw me through despite sickness stops.

 

I’m human! But I have a set self-responsibility,

To achieve what I set out to, by beating diabetes.

A moment of shire pride and emotional gain,

Was carrying through crowds the gold torch with Olympic Flame!

 

Diabetes didn’t stop me from getting an education,

I may have messed about but 2 degrees is a satisfaction…

Diabetes could have been hard but one thing is key;

If I didn’t have diabetes, then what kind of man would I be?

 

Next up is something so extreme it’s unrealistic,

30 miles for 30 days through Great Britain, I’m optimistic;

Is this humanly possible, even in seeing specialists from High Wycombe?

I have one answer: “Do you know who I am!?”

 

The Diabetic Dialogue

Posted on by
Reply

Came across this the other day and liked it. This was a college write up I had to do 2 or 3 years ago on my way to getting my first degree in Professional Writing. It had to be 2000 words give or take, a short-story with a twist ending. This is all fictional writing based on true experiences to some extent but very much concerning diabetes. I’d like to say that my character in real life is not the character in this story even though I keep my name!

Enjoy the work of a young genius…

The Diabetic Dialogue

It was within the first two weeks I came to terms with it all. I learned everything I needed to learn. I understood it. The details of being ‘hyper’ and being ‘hypo’– as the pancreas no longer creates insulin to balance out sugar-levels in the blood system the body will either run high with glucose, or become drained from the natural energy-substance; the term hypo being the latter. This can usually occur after exercise, or perhaps from a miscalculation when injecting insulin into the blood system. When one is ‘hyper’ that means the blood sugar levels are running hi, too much un-controlled glucose. I learned all the basics within the first two weeks, and I continued learning as I lived on as one, I became the condition to an extent. I became a type-one diabetic… and it became me.

“Mr Griffiths?” the middle-aged nurse came out and said whilst I sat at the table of my diabetes clinic, reading the charity magazines on the tables.

I put the magazine down for a second and looked over towards the front desk of the diabetes clinic, I didn’t say anything, didn’t have to, just gave the look…

“If you’d like to come through with me please,” she put her hand out towards the door, a short woman with short hair – reminded me of one of those bad creatures from that Lord of the Rings film I saw a long time ago, nothing against the woman, sure she was nice on the inside… just nothing to look at on the outside; certainly wasn’t going to get my blood-levels racing for my check up.

I went through the doors that she guided her hands towards; she followed me in and pointed at the chair.

“If you’d like to take a seat Gavin,” she again instructed.

Looking about the room there were paintings over the walls, cartoon paintings of Disney characters; there was Dumbo, Mickey and Pooh – not to mention Eeyor the one taking care of me.

“I hear you’re new at this clinic then, recently moved this way?” She asked as if it was anything to do with her life.

“Yeah,” I responded looking up at her after looking at the paintings on the wall and again pondering if I was speaking with one of the characters from the wall paintings – maybe Tweedle-Dee, “just transferred to this clinic now.”

“How are you finding life here then? – where have you moved from?” She waffled on as if my life was her main interest.

“…I’ve got to be heading out soon I’m in a bit of a rush nurse, can we get it all out the way please?”

The nurse measured and weighed me as well as checked my long-term blood HBA1C level: 5ft 8 inches in height, 70 kg’s in weight and, as the Doc later confirmed, 6.5 on my HBA1C – my overall control as good as though I weren’t even a diabetic.
The plan had been on my mind a while, it was the reason I was reading those diabetes magazines whilst waiting for my check-up, it was the plan of a life-time. I could do it. Many people would follow me doing it, support me in doing it – pay their money to sponsor me to do it.

The magazines were charity magazines: Diabetes UK; JDRF to name a few. Raising money for diabetes care. One matter always struck me about these charities: they employ people. How do they afford to pay their employees? – do the government pay it through taxes? – No surely not, a thought strikes through the mind of David Cameron waffling on about the importance of cuts during the morning news. So where does the money come from? – The people? No. Yes. The sponsor money. People pay for the cause, an amount goes to the cause, and the rest must go on wages. Cure? No – wages, yes. One thing was noticeable in those magazines, nothing really stood out. Nothing extreme came out the papers to pull someone in with amazement, did it? – it talked about a few half celebrities having a tea party and a group dinner and ball… all about fighting diabetes – but where was the fight? I failed to see it on those pages.

Athletics:

It’s a long race around a 400 metre track – 12.5 laps round – 5000 metres. The track is longer than it appears; at least it feels it whilst you run. Those who take off early pay the price, I know it, I watch it, I take advantage of it. The same consistent pace is needed; the same consistent pace is used; the same consistent pace that can be upped a notch at the end wins. At the back of a pack of twelve runners to start with, in the bottom three at the end of the second lap, bottom four by the end of the third – but it’s the same pace, others change. I could go on for miles and miles using the same pace, others can’t. They slow. I keep the pressure on. Lap 5: position 6th; Lap 6: position 5th – a perfect place to stay for a while, breathing on the backs of the front pack to watch them drain out of energy. Lap 9 is a pounce up into the top 4 whilst the other runner drops out of the pack. Come lap 10 my pace increases, it could have stayed the same for hours, but it’s a race, it increases, my position in the race increases as others tire. By the end of lap 11 I’m on 2nd places tale and he knows it, he ups his pace with whatever he has left but there’s another lap and a half to go for him and his burned out of energy, I can feel it. Lap 12 is where I up the pace further more. The leader looks back over his shoulder, sweat drips from his brow, he begins to push it harder like the previous 2nd place runner did, that runner is now being caught by 4th and 5th place a good number of metres behind. The final half lap is where I win. My running coach on the side line knows it. The runner currently in the lead knows it. And what counts the most: I know it. When everyone else is drained from energy I pick mine up, as though I’ve sucked all the energy out of them. And then… the ultimate sprint finish.

“Great running Gav!” my coach shouts out, applauding his hands as I finish.

Coach turns to the others watching on, looking to Roger who owns the Athletics club.

“He’s a strong runner,” says Roger.

“Yeah he’s like a machine; just don’t make him sprint any longer than that!” coach replies.

I warm down in front of them, drinking my bottle of water. Roger calls me over…

“Gavin, you should try something bigger than track running, you’re a long-distance runner like I used to be,” he says, “before you began sprinting at the end there, how long did you feel you could have gone on for exactly?”

“Until I win,” was my response.

“You’re a marathon runner like I once was, and you’ve got the ability to succeed.”

Getting noticed by Roger is a confidence boost. He is the one who the big-fish come to in checking out talent, some say he was exceptionally quick in his time at running single miles alone. My talent is that I can run all day long. Not sure if that’s a talent, a gift or if there is something wrong with me. But, it fits into my plan.

The Run:

I knew in my mind I had put myself in for a tough challenge, that was obvious; I knew it even more on the ferry over to the Isle. Approaching the giant blob of land rising out of the sea, the left side curved almost out of sight, the right side from the angle I looked from was out of sight. I was going to run that. It was crazy. It was genius.

The local news press came down to see me start and snap a few photographs for the local papers. I posed in my Diabetes UK running vest and Nike brand running shorts and trainers. The weather was foggy. Cold and foggy. Not the expected forecast for a summers day. I posed almost as though I was some kind of hero, a little smile into the cameras, one shot with my fists clenched. A crowd gathered around to see me off, mainly old people with nothing better to do but to jump on a random coach and go somewhere random for the day. They were my biggest fans. Then once the groupies had finished telling me to “take it easy around the Isle” and offering me sandwiches and biscuits, once the photographer had had enough of taking shots of me warm up along the pier, I was off.

I ran at my calm pace. A strong pace, yet not one to push the motor too hard – 3rd gear pace. I could go on in third all day without running out of petrol. Fourth would still be comfortable. I ran clockwise beside the sea, following the ‘coastal route’ signs, the fog stayed low, the sea stayed by my side – offering a hard windy chill to blow against me, the seagulls remained hovering above me. The hills continued to incline. Up, up, up, down, and then up again… like one big upward hill. On my back I carried a black bag with white writing boldly across it: ‘Sponsor Me’. Every now and then I’d stop to stretch and talk up a few locals who looked on…

“What are ye doing here then?” some asked, in this case an old local island man with white hair and an ‘uncle Albert’ style white beard.

“I’m running,” the logic answer.

“What ye running for then?”

“…Diabetes. I’m going around the Isle.”

“Round thee Isle, cor I never, good cause that – tell ye what,” he searches his dusty pockets, a few screwed up tissues fall out first, then a screwed up five pound note. He puts it in my hand.

“There be some sponsorship for ye, good luck son,” he tells me. I put the money in the bag on my back and then it’s back to the road.

It is dangerous at times, when away from the sea country lanes appear, I can’t see anything around the corner, they can’t see me. My pace eases up a little and I drift into the middle of the road, wave my hands out if I’m unsure, and then pick up the pace again.

Occasionally there is the odd field to run across, avoiding the cows and bulls along the way. Sheep sometimes scramble away from me. I carry my energy drinks on me, one in my hand a couple more in the back-bag. The stretch stops are always in the more public areas, the towns on the seaside are the main places where the change fills up in my bag.

I come to a dead end along the way. The road signs aren’t great on this upward Isle, in fact they are all but non-existent, the coastal path signs come and go, they don’t mention anything about a steep dropping crevasse interfering with the route or rock climbing. I had a decision to make… go all the way back and try to find another route (could be miles) or climb, climb, stare down the rocky steep drop into the sea, take a run up and jump, hold on for dear life, climb down and run on. I opted for the later.

Day one I had covered 35 miles. I had raised a fair amount of wads in the back-bag, stopping at a café with a few parked-up coaches was a help. Day two, after an iced-bath followed up by a hot one immediately after at the campsite the night before, I was nearly there, running with a hard ache down the legs, battling with the stiffness, but running nonetheless. The finish was in sight. It was a mighty pull to get that far, each step begun to ache, and for a moment was on the rocks. It was as though I had driven into the dreaded runner’s wall at 100 miles per hour. I couldn’t do it. I could do it. A glimpse was all I needed of the finish line, hills no longer mattered, the power flooded back, the pace picked up, the gear cranked up to 5th, and I sprinted across the finish point.

And then home.

After packing up my tent and belongings at the campsite, and suffering another iced bath, off to home…

Collecting more money on the Ferry…

Home?

Or away again?

A bag with well over a grand’s worth of money inside it… Away it is! I pick up the home phone…

…“Hello, yep, I would like to book on the offer I saw on your website, yep that’s it, the year around the world ticket please. Erm… no I have no medical conditions… My name? It’s Chris, Chris Brasher.”

Gavin of Goa

Posted on by
Reply

Taking you back a way here… April 2009… in Goa, India.

It was a family holiday when I was still in Sixth Form as a late teenage lad. At first on this Holiday I was only with my parents, as sister, Kaylie Griffiths, was involved performing at a show and was to meet us out there. Being on my own, and being quite the type for adventure, I made a decision one afternoon to explore outside the hotel walls in South Goa, where foreign people to the area were not so common. In fact judging by the reaction of many as I passed through the town, I was one of the first white westerners to have passed through their village. (most on holiday stick to the nearby beach, restaurants or luxury hotel area).

I set out with a beach/football, I had purchased from a day at the market, in hand. And as I walked through this village, out in the extreme Indian summer heat (it was April, just before their monsoon season) firstly I went by a few shops. The shop worker came out in seeing me, as I resembled money. Not seeing any reason why not, I followed him into the shop and looked about – it was all wooden inside, including everything he was selling, all carved designs. Although I hadn’t any money on me at that moment to buy anything, we got talking; he told me that he had left home at the age of 13 to earn money, no school just work. He moved across India to end up there in Goa, now a skinny man in his early twenties.

The next shop keeper then called me in as I continued on my travels, he looked richer, a shirt on and long hair, and his shop had more appeal to it – jewellery. After talking to him a while he asked me what I did for a living. Instead of boring him with a sixth form student, I had a Crystal Palace top on and a football in hand, “I play for Crystal Palace youth academy,” I informed him. This gave him an element of excitement. He mentioned that he knew the coach of one of their professional football teams, SC Saogoa, which gave me an element of excitement when he mentioned possibly getting me to train with them!

Further on in my route, as I aimed to go to a playing field in which I spotted a football pitch with wooden goalposts with the anticipation that there would be someone there to play football with, I passed the village itself. An elderly man stopped me and called me into his home. He did not speak any English so we communicated through a lot of hand gestures. His house was in fact a shack, made from wood, but he had a lot of family living with him, I said hello and raised a thumb upwards when I believed he was asking me what I thought of his place. He was very proud of his home and seemed delighted to show it to me – with my hair gelled up as it was at the time, and boyish looks from a different culture, I imagine I came across as some kind of flash superstar.

Eventually I made it to the football pitch area. I saw a few kids playing football with a flat ball, using cricket stumps for goalposts. I passed them the ball I had over as I approached them and they appeared to freeze in shock at the sight of me to begin with. Then one knocked the ball back to me as I joined in their game. Football in that respect has one language, completely different cultures and languages understanding one another, that is the beautiful game at its best – which is much more than the rubbish I view on the TV with all those professional drama queens in the present day, a game run by greed. We played, I ware converses on my feet… they didn’t even wear shoes! It was very hot, and considering I am a Type 1 diabetic, perhaps I took a risk running about in those conditions – despite the evening drawing in it was still between the 35-40 degrees mark! Fortunately, diabetes aside, I am incredibly fit!

The amazing part of this story is coming… one by one more people turned up, men from the village, some even with trainers or at least shoes on. One by one… two by two… soon there were enough there for a full on 11 v 11 match – and that’s exactly what they were there for!

“You, you play for us tonight!” a keen footballing middle-aged villager named Godfrey informed me.

It turned out that every month outside the monsoon period the two local villages took each on in a competitive football match…

“We haven’t beaten them for very long time,” Godfrey explained, “it has been years! But now we have you!”

…No pressure!

So on the football pitch, with an uneven surface of dried out grass, marked out with wooden nailed-together-goalposts at either end, the game got underway. The difficult part was that it was very hard to tell who was on my team – I didn’t know anybody and we had no kit! Godfrey was the one guy I could pick out, and our main striker… Chief! – the oldest football player in the village, in his late 60′s, with long quite tribal appearing grey hair, no shirt on… I put him through on goal and he had to stop to catch his breath before miss-kicking the ball in his bear-feet…

I got the ball and took people on, it just so happened that when I was a nipper I was a decent footballer, and until my ankle-ligament tears that season, was playing a semi-pro standard in youth level. I was on the mend and focusing on RUNNING ahead of the 2009 Isle of Wight Challenge for Diabetes UK. I cut round a few players and scored 4 goals in the game, which we won 4-0.

…That was a game which made me some kind of hero to the Goan village I was staying in! After that, everywhere I went, every single person knew my name! It was crazy! I went to a restaurant… “GAVIN!” To a beach shack… “GAVIN!!” To the bar at the Hotel… “GAVIN!!!” Past the Taxi booth… “GAVIN!!!!” By the shops, or tent-shops… “GAVIN!!!!!!” Pretty much anywhere… “GAVINNNN!!!!!!!!”

For a moment I experienced what it felt like to be David Beckham…

Two nights later the villages had arranged another game whilst I was there. This time, according to Godfrey, the opposition village ‘main players’ back. They were younger, with football kits on. What was more noticeable to me was that on the road and hills around the pitch, the area was completely filled with watching on villagers, they’d come to see me play!

My dad went to find me and he said a Taxi driver stopped as he saw him and shouted… “TAXI!?”

When my dad replied, “No, I’m looking for my son…”

The driver instantly responded with: “Who, Gavin!? He is over playing football, I take you there!”

It was a tense match, we fell behind early on, and the markers on the opposing team doubled up on me. But I managed to grab a goal when cutting in, and despite the heat I was the fittest engine on the pitch as I put myself about and it was soon 3-1 as I claimed another hattrick. My team appeared to tire out a bit, and the other side got back into it at 3-3, but in a game with no referee to keep a check on the time, I suppose late on… I found the ball at my feet as I used ‘Messi’ teckers to cut around a few players before getting my head up and picking out a very LOUD Godfrey. From all of 5 yards out when my ball arrived to him, Godfrey absolutely put his foot through it to score! 4-3… Godfrey couldn’t believe it! There were still a few moments left for me to add another, this after Chief was bundled over in the supposed penalty area. I stepped up from the imaginary penalty spot to tuck away the last goal of the game, 5-3.

It was a very good experience going to Goa, the people out there seemed very proud of what they had, and happy to talk – which is quite a contrast to what I see over in my hometown, Bexleyheath. This, despite the fact we have money here, big buildings, food, and more… they have wooden shacks to live in!

As a Type 1 diabetic, sure in those conditions blood levels would expect to drop, but I had good control, I ate well and I kept hydrated, which was more important than energy drinks out there in my opinion. As for my running abilities, I went on a early morning beach run one morning, a rough half-marathon distance through a few villages and back. In that heat… Core Blimey, it takes some fitness!